Under Pressure...

[Damon]

Ok, here we have a very interesting situation. After a few races with many Ralf fans spitting feathers in an attempt to get us JPM fans to admit to mistakes from 'our man', will we get the same in return?

The fact is that whilst being being caught by JPM, Ralf cocked up today, plain and simple. How will the Ralf fans see it?

[Tristan]

Yes. However, whilst I remain faithful to my Monty, Ralf had outclassed him all weekend. Again.

[Mr V]

but the drivers gotta be in the right place at the end of the race.......just as rafe was in maylasia and brazil!

[f1manoz]

Ralf was on top of JPM until he made that mistake. It's the results on race day that count.

[Cougar]

"spitting feathers"? "cocked up"? I saw no chickens on the course...

[Damon]

Well put mr v. Plus Monty was only 1 tenth down in qualifying after all the problems he had.

[Nicholas]

He didn't cock up, he understeered.







It worked for TGF...

[Mr V]

i honestly believe that had it not have been for abit of a cock up in jpm's 1st stop that cost him about 2-3 seconds he would have "got" rafe anyway!

[f1grandprixshop]

give both the bmw boys a break!

[calais]

who's ahead on points??????
not halfie!!

[f1grandprixshop]

you better wait till next GP.

[Raven]

Ralf didn't really have anything on Juan this race, JPM was actually looking faster when Ralf went off as well.

A poor error from someone of Ralf's experience.

[Sato san]

Its good for Juan to get the upper hand at this race . It keeps it all exciting .

Ralf did seem to go off under pressure though .

[EERO]

Unfortunately, compared to Ralf's older brother, neither of them is looking like the WDC. I think they are still fairly evenly matched, and calling one a loser at the expense of the other is narrow-minded and short-sighted. How can some one be God's gift one week and a steaming pile of manure the next. The arguements make no sense whatsoever.

The cars are on the edge all the time and at those limits, mistakes will happen.. If Michael and Ferrari were not so on top of their game right now, the converasation would be moot.

[f1grandprixshop]

well said.

[R]

Ralf has certainly upped his game and done well in relation to Montoya this season. That doesn't take away the fact that Juan was better this weekend (considering his problems) and Ralf himself made that mistake. Besides, Montoya looked faster at that point when Ralf went off, and barring the pit stop problems, JPM would probably have beaten him anyway. Monty is ahead of Ralf in the drivers standings now, and deservedly so, especially considering the unfair penalty he received in Malaysia, and the way he was "wing-clipped" by TGF in Brazil.

I am 99 % certain JPM will beat Ralf in the final standings this season. The only reservations I take are matters which are beyond JPM's control, like reliability problems and messed up pit stops, etc. And we all know who's had the majority of those problems so far in this duo's career together at Williams...

[f1manoz]

It doesn't take long around here for one driver to be lept upon just because he does bad in one particular race.

Ralf made a mistake this race but lets not forget JPM was off the pace last time out, bad car or not.

How about we agree that they are as good as each other at the moment and neither have really shown complete dominance as yet?

[Damon]

The reason for this thread was to see how the Ralf fans would react to what happened in spain. As you say it dosn't take long for a driver to be lept upon, that sure is what happened to Montoya after imola despite the fact that he had been quicker than Ralf in all the previous races. Now the boot is on the other foot (again) and many of the Ralf fans around here are strangely quiet .

[Red]

Originally posted by Damon
[...]is what happened to Montoya after imola despite the fact that he had been quicker than Ralf in all the previous races. [...]

Errr...... this is not exactly the way I observed the 2002 season.....

[Mr V]

theoriclly damon is right........obviously jpm was faster than rafe in oz (due to the accident with rubens) and jpm set fastest laps in maylasia and brazil, so he was faster, but, it don't matter how much faster he was, for one reason or another he was behind!

[calais]

red, he did have a quicker race pace than halfie in all the races this year, bar imola

[Red]

I would agree with Oz; Not Spain; other than those, Mr V is right: for a reason or another he was behind. (plus, the score for the quals is 3-2 in Ralf's favor) I believe that "quickest in all the previous races" is a bit exaggerated.

[RussianFriend]

Originally posted by R
Ralf has certainly upped his game and done well in relation to Montoya this season. That doesn't take away the fact that Juan was better this weekend (considering his problems) and Ralf himself made that mistake. Besides, Montoya looked faster at that point when Ralf went off, and barring the pit stop problems, JPM would probably have beaten him anyway. Monty is ahead of Ralf in the drivers standings now, and deservedly so, especially considering the unfair penalty he received in Malaysia, and the way he was "wing-clipped" by TGF in Brazil.

I am 99 % certain JPM will beat Ralf in the final standings this season. The only reservations I take are matters which are beyond JPM's control, like reliability problems and messed up pit stops, etc. And we all know who's had the majority of those problems so far in this duo's career together at Williams...

Agreed! Montoya´s car suffered serious problem on qualification session but the guy managed to take position on second row by the end of qualification. If the problems ware fixed earlier he would outqualified Ralf. Anyway Montoya has 23 scores opposite of Ralf´s 20.

[Glen]

Yet again (as happened often last year) Montoya had to relax and let the car do the work before he found a decent qualifying lap. It must be really frustrating to have all that hard-charging car-chucking ability and not be free to use it.

Montoya needs two more calm and professional finishes to minimise the loss of points in the forthcoming difficult races - then he can let it rip in Montreal and we'll see where they are.

On fastest laps - of course they aren't meaningless and can only be an encouragement, but they often fall to an also-ran in a race because the leader usually has enough in reserve to back-off and save the car towards the end of the race. Michael, for example, picks up fastest lap relatively seldom.

[Mania]

Maan, you Montoya lovers really crack me up. Lets not forget, prior to Ralf having that "off" - he was easily ahead of his team mate and keeping him at bay without much of a problem - easily outqualified him and stayed ahead of him in practice sessions as well. At the end of the day, Ralf had a bad day on Sunday - though it became worse due to the Williams team screwing up his pit stops and making him pit for a nose twice rather than once.

It's all academic though - even if Ralf had not had an off - he would still not have finished the race thanks to the engine failure on the last lap.

You can all high five each other if you like though

We'll see who's ahead at the end of the season in the standings. It'll easily be Ralf. He's been ahead on pace for most of the season already and It'll stay that way - Why? Simple. Cos he's That Damn Good .